Help Solve My Mystery! (#52 Weeks)

No Story Too Small has issued a New Year’s Challenge: “Have one blog post each week devoted to a specific ancestor. It could be a story, a biography, a photograph, an outline of a research problem — anything that focuses on one ancestor.”

This week’s focus is a “brick wall”…. Perhaps someone in cyberspace knows of a source that could solve my mystery!

My 3rd great grand uncle, Brian Hall, was born to Brian Hall and Polly Lane in Norton, Massachusetts on 24 May 1797. He was one of eight children who lived to adulthood. Siblings included Polly, Isaac, Sophia, Marcia, Milton, Horatio and Ephraim Lane.

Around 1821, the family relocated to Rhode Island.

In 1830 & 1832, Brian a junior laborer, was living on Hope Street, in Providence, with his parents1.

Between 1832 and 1835, Brian married Henrietta Hutchins of Providence, daughter of Richard Hutchins and Henrietta Woodward. She is mentioned as his wife, giving up rights of dower in numerous land transactions between Brian and his brothers on a piece of land called India Point in Seekonk, which today is part of Providence, RI2.

India Point about 1840, http://tinyurl.com/ln2bode

They had one known child in February 1835, who died at the age of two weeks. Henrietta died 11 March 1838 at the age of 433.

About a year later, on 23 March 1839, a marriage intention was filed in Seekonk between Brian Hall and Lucy Mason4. Five days later, Brian died on 28 March 1839 at age 425. No marriage record has been found.

The land is described as follows: “…the real estate of said deceased consists of two parcels of land which are under separated mortgages the first of which contains seventy acres more or less is bounded Northerly by a road and Westerly by land of Jm (?) Mason & land which the said deceased purchased of William Hill – the second of which contains thirty acres more or less and is bounded Northerly by a road easterly by the first above mentioned lot, Southerly by the land of Jm (?) Mason and Westerly by land of Josiah Kent and Thomas L. Peck…” [In 1840, Josiah Kent, Thomas Peck and James Mason are enumerated within a few names of one another in Seekonk, Bristol, Massachusetts].

Grantee Index (Brian is the buyer)

Grantor Index (Brian is the seller)

April 15, 1840, James Smith cancels the mortgage given to him by Brian Hall.

Brian’s brother, my 3rd g-grandfather, Horatio Hall, later named two of his daughter’s Lucy Mason Hall:

– Lucy Mason Hall [#1], born 2 February 1840, daughter of Horatio and Elizabeth, died of dropsy at age 5 on 4 November 1844 in Malden, Massachusetts6.

– A portion of the obituary of the Lucy #2 reads: “Miss Lucy Mason Hall of 29 Richardson Street died at her home Saturday noon of heart failure after an illness of less than half an hour. Miss Hall was at work in the kitchen when first taken ill and had suffered heart attacks before. She was born in this city and was the daughter of Horatio and Elizabeth Pindar Hall7.

Brian’s Lucy Mason went on to marry Abel Cooper in 18428and lived in Rhode Island until her death on 7 Jan 18839. Abel died in 1857 of Typhoid Fever; for a time Lucy resided with her sister Martha Mason and became a Tailoress10. By 1880 she resided in a home with her brother-in-law William Cooper and was reported to have consumption (likely pulmonary tuberculosis)11.

So many questions, but what I really want to know:

– How did Brian die? Was it a tragic/sudden death or was he sick? If he was ill, did he expect to recover or did he file the marriage intention knowing his days were numbered?

– Why did Horatio name his daughter(s) Lucy Mason Hall? Were they close? Did Lucy stay in touch with the Hall family after Brian’s death?

I thought maybe Lucy was pregnant and Horatio raised the child as his own, but the dates don’t work; Lucy Mason #1’s birth was recorded ten months after Brian’s death.